Colby
by HelenAandNicolE
Summary: When Gabriella and Troyʼs very different lives cross in an unexpected way, neither of them could have predicted how very different their lives would turn out to be, all because of his little girl. Meet Colby. TROYELLA, minor CHAYLOR.
1. One step forward, Two steps back

Hi everyone!

This is the first co-written fic we have done, so please give us your thoughts. We've decided to have Troy and Gabriella meet under very different circumstances at a different time of their lives.

Here's chapter 1, where we get to find out a little bit more about their lives. Enjoy!

Love Helena X

Nicole says… Hey everyone, Helena and I are really excited about this new story so I hope you enjoy it. Also, the credit of this chapter goes all to Helena, who did an absolutely amazing job! The next chapter should be done soon! Thanks for reading and reviewing!

Chapter one

One Step forward, two steps back

As the sun reflected brightly off the marble table top of one of the most exquisite coffee shops in town, Gabriella smiled to herself as she scanned the front page of the newspaper.

The headline read "Montez helps man land over $100,000 dollars in a shocking divorce settlement". She smiled to herself. She knew more of his money should probably have gone to his ex wife, but after what his ex wife had done and hearing the way she had treated him, Gabriella was determined that he would walk away from his divorce victorious.

She was renowned for being one of the best lawyers around and was always in demand. Her motto for every case was that she was "In it, to win it". This motto had always worked well for her, and she won almost every case she ever worked on, so far.

Gabriella was a go-getter. She put work before anything else, and it paid off. She had done extremely well in school, and then went on to study at Yale University. She now works at, and hopes to someday own her Father's Law office 'Schwartz and Montez'.

She loved being in the courtroom, the adrenalin rush she got every time it was her turn to talk, knowing that people were hanging on her every word, knowing that what _she_ said could have the power to make or break a person. It reminded her of the feeling she had when she once starred in a musical during her high school years. 'Twinkle Towne' it was called. Whenever she thought about it, it brought back such fond memories to her, it reminded her of the friends she had made, and those she had lost.

However, the success of her career came at price. She spent almost all her waking hours working on a case either at home or work, which left little time for a social life, let alone a love life. Her best friend Taylor McKessie, now Danforth, a successful doctor in her field of Obstetrics, insisted they meet up once a week for a coffee. It was about the only social contact Gabriella had outside of work, apart from seeing her brother and his family.

It wasn't that she didn't want to see people; she just never seemed to find the time. She lived in a large four bedroom house on a beautiful street in a suburban area of Albuquerque, not far from her closest friends Taylor, Chad and their daughter Kyla.

Aside from worrying about work, Gabriella lived a pretty good life. Although the majority of her four bedroom house was un-used, she had bought it, simply because she could. She enjoyed knowing she could go out whenever she liked and buy anything she wanted.

She had recently come to the conclusion that money would always be enough in life to make her happy. It didn't matter that she didn't have a husband, or kids, or a busy social life, because she thought all she needed in life to make her happy was her money. She thought that money would always be enough in life to make her happy. How wrong she was…

-------

On the other side of town, a young man, probably no older than 28, was finishing yet another long day at work. His clothes were grubby and stubble covered his sun tanned face. Being a construction worker, he, like the others, spent most of his days working in the hot Albuquerque sun.

As he climbed into his truck, he sighed heavily. He worked so hard, yet the money he had earned was barely enough to put food on the table and pay the bills. He was about the drive off, when he heard someone calling his name.

"Troy, TROY" he heard his boss call to him. He wondered if he was going to tell him he was leaving two hours too early. He knew he was leaving early, as he did every day. He had a small daughter to collect from school, and his boss knew that. He was all ready to explain this to him, when the man handed him his wallet.

"You sure do make a man run" he panted, catching his breath again. "Here, you forgot this, thought you might need it".

"Thanks" Troy said, squinting to see the man in the sunshine. He looked absentmindedly for his sun glasses, but to his dismay, he remembered he has broken them only the other day.

He drove the short trip from the construction site to the elementary school. When he got to the school, the light of his life, his seven year old daughter Colby was waiting for him.

"Daddy" she beamed, seeing him walk across the school yard. She knew he was popular amongst the other parents as some of her friends had told her their mom's thought he was 'hot'. A comment which only fueled his fondness for his looks.

A number of moms raced over to say 'Hi' to him as soon as they saw him walk into the school yard. He made polite conversation as he smiled to them. Some of them were pretty 'hot' themselves, shame they were married he thought to himself, walking away as Colby gabbled away about her day at school.

"Some of my friends are starting ballet class daddy" she said excitedly, as she climbed into his truck. "Can I start too? It's on Saturday mornings and…"

"I'm sorry Colby" he said sadly, feeling awful for disappointing her. "If I had the money I would but right now, we just can't, okay princess. Sorry" he said again, knowing he had probably just broken his daughter's heart.

"It's okay daddy, I understand" she said quietly as a small tear rolled down her cheek. She leaned her forehead against the window, watching the cars go by as he took her to the place they called home.

Sometimes, Colby wondered why her daddy didn't have lots of money. He worked all the time, she knew that. But they never seemed to have enough money to do all the things her friends did.

Hearing Colby sniffle slightly, he knew she was crying. It broke his heart to know he couldn't give Colby what she wanted. The nagging worry that was constantly at the back of his mind was the fact Colby didn't have a mother, and he knew she needed that more desperately than anything else.

----

What neither Troy nor Gabriella knew was that something they hadn't even known they were looking for was closer than they ever imagined possible.

**-----------------**

**Thank-you for reading, please leave a short review with your thoughts, all feedback greatly appreciated. Chapter two up soon X**


	2. First Impressions

**A/N: Hey everyone, thanks for reading and we hope you enjoy. Next Chapter should be up by next week. THANKS and please leave us your thoughts**

**Nicole**

**A/N:** **Hope you enjoy this great chapter written by Nicole. Good work Nicole :D**

**Please let us know what you think by leaving a short review.**

**Helena xxx**

**Disclaimer: Only our ideas**

**Chapter Two**

**First Impressions**

"Miss Montez"

A young woman with dark haired curls continued towards the door.

"Miss Montez!"

That same young woman relieved a sigh as she continued her strut.

"MISS MONTEZ!"

The dark haired woman turned around in a huff. "What?" She snapped, shouting louder than she'd planned.

The young receptionist jumped out of her skin slightly as the woman's response. She didn't have to yell at the messenger!

"You have a call". She held the phone out cowardly at arm's length. A grimace was etched on her features as she held the phone across the front desk of the Lawyers office, she didn't want to get snapped at by Gabriella again by making her go into her office to retrieve it.

Gabriella slowly made her way over to the desk, sending darts into the eyes of the receptionist; she was so close to being let off early for the day. She pulled the phone out of Maureen's hands, making the woman jump, yet again.

"Gabriella speaking" She held back her annoyance, sounding so sweet for the spit fire that she was. There were a few exchanged "Yes's and No's" before the young woman let out a sigh and a final 'fine'. She literally threw the phone Maureen's way and surprisingly, the jumpy receptionist was able to get a hold on it before it slammed down on the granite desk top.

"Don't call me again today Maureen, I am going." These were the last words Maureen heard Gabriella speak as she watched the young woman pull open the pristine glass front door of the office and disappear into the afternoon sunshine.

As Gabriella reached her car, she threw her purse in and got in the driver's seat. Next stop… Brown Rock Elementary.

------------

As she made her way into the school, the place smelled like mixture of water and cleaning alcohol, a smell that made Gabriella wrinkle her nose in disgust. She was grateful that she wasn't the one who had to each lunch here every day. As she looked around, parents and screaming children were everywhere. Not counting the younger classes that were attending the short play.

One such class was her sister's Kindergarten class. Twenty four year old Emma Montez, the youngest of the Montez siblings. Emma had been the Kindergarten teacher there ever since she had qualified. She had dreamed of being a teacher for years. Teaching was the love of her life.

Brown Rock Elementary was also the school that their Thirty two year old brother's eldest daughter attended, seven year old Morgan Montez.

Despite her short stature and young age, she had her auntie Gabi wrapped around her little finger- the exact reason for why Gabriella Montez, a high class lawyer was sitting in an elementary school cafeteria taking in a not so pleasing scent.

She slightly regretted not leaving the office a few minutes earlier, because if she did, she would have missed her brother's call asking her to tape Morgan's play at school since him or his wife, Holly couldn't attend. But here she was, waiting on an uncomfortable chair for a bunch of first graders to come on stage trying to recite a sentence that they tried for weeks to remembering yet still seemed to mess them up. Just the thought of that caused Gabriella to throw her head back and breathe; it was supposed to be her afternoon off. She had not enjoyed the phone call she had had to make to cancel her massage. She sighed deeply, massaging her temples as she rested her elbows on the table.

"Hard day?"

Gabriella snapped her head up at the sound of the strange voice and laid her eyes on the speaker. She looked at the stranger with a questioning stare. He shrugged at the silence, taking the unoccupied seat next to her. She moved away slightly after briefly taking in his appearance.

"I always get dragged into these things. Never seem to be able to say no!" His arms were crossed and he slouched slightly in the chair. As Gabriella studied his demeanor, she concluded that he couldn't be any older than she was.

Gabriella replicated his posture, much to her own surprise, and muttered a weary sentence.

"Tell me about it." The blue eyed man looked her way with silence, the way her makeup had been immaculately applied to her face, her clothes pristine.

"Don't get me wrong, I love her, course I do! But it was meant to be my afternoon off work. To have some time to myself"

"Time to yourself?" he laughed slightly. "How do you get that because I'll take pointers!" The young man looked just as exhausted as her. His pants were plastered with cement and paint while his shirt looked grubby, like the stains were long set into the fabric.

"Delegation… I guess" she pondered as she pulled herself back up in her chair as she pulled the video camera out, ready for anything. "Half the time I have to force myself to forget about my commitments or my 'To do' list would never get any smaller"

"Hmm, forgetting, isn't that neglect?" The man also pulled himself up in his seat, getting a little confused.

Gabriella looked at the man, quite confused herself, what was he talking about.

"Wait… What?" she questioned, turning to face him. Silence lingered for a moment before a certain blue eyed man broke it.

"What were you talking about?" he asked, his eyes locking with hers.

"Work! What about you?"

"Being a parent. You have a kid in first grade too right? Not that I've seen you around much. I'm sure I would have remembered someone as pretty as you around school!"

"But I'm not a…" she trailed off, realizing the confusion. "Oh, you though I was a parent. No, I'm here for my niece, my brother or his wife couldn't come so I'm tapping it for them." She pointed towards the video camera in her hand. Their attention was quickly diverted from the camera to the stage as the crowd got silent, well as silent as the excited first graders could manage.

"Which one is yours…" his breath ticked her ear slightly. She rolled her eyes; didn't she just tell him that she didn't have a kid?

She thought it would just be best to reply instead of fight. "That little girl there, Morgan" She pointed towards the young girl to the right of the stage, getting ready to speak.

"That's mine right there." He pointed, to the small girl with her hair in pigtails. Gabriella couldn't help but shrug her shoulders as his breath tickled her ear again.

She kept her attention on the stage though, taking in the child that he was pointing to, a sandy blonde girl with chocolate brown eyes.

"That's my little girl, Colby"

Gabriella kept her eyes on the young child for a moment before sneaking a peek at Troy. His eyes seemed to glow at the sight of the child, a smile beaming across his face.

She kept quiet for the time being, tapping the events on stage as they occurred and clapping for joy when Morgan nailed her lines, but in all, most of her own thoughts were concentrated on the guy next to her. She always had a weak point for making first expressions, it was her one downfall.

Thoughts raced through her mind, causing her stomach to flutter slightly. It was almost as if there were two voices in her head, her conscience and her heart.

'His appearance was quite repulsive'

'But his eyes were gorgeous'

'Is that really his kid? He looks way too young to be a father'

'Thank goodness this is a onetime encounter!'

She shook her head slightly, trying to focus her attention back on her niece's play, which was drawing to a close on stage.

It's human nature to judge someone on appearance, how they seem on the surface. However, first impressions are often not enough to make judgments on a person. Sometimes events in life may just prove those first impressions very, very wrong!

**Please leave a review!**


	3. Fancy that

**Chapter Three**

**Fancy That **

"Thanks so much for doing this Gabs," her sister-in-law Holly said as Gabriella's niece Morgan trooped into her immaculately clean entrance hall. Gabriella held onto the door handle and using the door for support, she could tell today was going to be a long day.

"It's fine" she said, her lips forming a half smile which to Holly looked more like a grimace at the thought of having a child in her house. She slowly watched Morgan prancing around on the tile floor, getting quite close to the front table with a small glass sculpture.

"You're a star" Holly smiled as she hugged Gabriella, kissing her cheek. "See you later Morgy" she called. Walking over to her daughter, she laid a kiss on her cheek. Instinctively, Morgan wiped her cheek with a look of disgust across her face as her mother turned to leave.

As the door slammed shut, Gabriella leaned against it, once again, letting out a huge sigh. What was she to do with Morgan all day? What did kids these days like to do?

As Gabriella walked into the living room, she saw Morgan unpacking her back pack, a wide array of Polly pockets spread across the carpet. She saw a smile peer across Morgan's face as she looked her aunt's way, dear god, how was she going to get out of this activity?

"Will you play with me Aunt Gabby?" she asked, flashing that angelic childlike smile, the one that she _knew_Gabi couldn't resist.

Gabriella crouched down by Morgan, cursing under her breath as she trod on one of Morgan's Polly pockets.

"I can't right now sweetie, I have some work to do, but you can watch the TV okay, do you how to work it all?" Even though she loved her nieces and nephew, she made sure that time over her house was limited; hence, she had no clue how this was going to go.

"Uhuh" Morgan giggled, climbing onto one of Gabriella's Chocolate Brown leather sofas. She let out a sigh, hoping that a quiet activity like TV would make the afternoon go more smoothly.

Gabriella switched the TV on and handed the remote to Morgan. As she walked in her office and cracked the door open, she could still hear the Barney theme tune.

"I can't believe they're still making Barney" she chuckled to herself. While a moment of quietness to herself in the office, a sudden strike of hunger hit her stomach. She was about the head to the kitchen when the sound of her front door chimes pulled her into the entrance hall. Hoping it was Holly back to collect Morgan early, she opened the door. Her hopeful spirit was quickly dashed when she realized that it wasn't her sister-in-law on the other side, but seeing who it was, she realised she was more than happy to greet them.

"Taylor!" she beamed, pulling her best friend into a hug.

"Oh and look! You brought Kyla!" she smiled, picking up the small girl and planting a kiss on her cheek. Kyla giggled, grabbing Gabriella's face with her hands and kissing her nose.

"You have _no _idea how pleased I am to see you right now". She again hugged Taylor, but with her one free arm this time.

"No…" Taylor said slowly. "But I hope you're going to share as you're scaring me slightly" she laughed.

"I have my niece Morgan here for the afternoon, I'm sure she'd love to play with Kyla. Come through, I'll introduce you". She beamed as she handed Kyla back to Taylor.

------------

"Can we go to the park?" Morgan asked, coming into the kitchen where Gabriella and Taylor were having a cup coffee each.

"Um… Sure" Gabriella smiled. She was silently panicking about the designer clothes she had on going anywhere near a park. "I'll just go change" she decided, racing up the stairs.

She scraped her hair back and pulled an old pair of sweats from her closet. At least if they got dirty it wouldn't matter too much.

She arrived back in the kitchen 10 minutes later, heading to the refrigerator and pulling out a bottle of water.

"You look more like you're going to the gym than going to a park" Taylor laughed.

"It's not like I'm going to see anyone, who else do I know who has kids?"

"Pretty much no-one?" Taylor guessed.

"Exactly!"

---------

"How about we go get ice-creams" Taylor suggested, Kyla laying sleepily in her arms. "Vanilla all round?"

"Sounds good to me" Gabriella said, putting her shades on as she relaxed in the sunshine. No sooner had she closed her eyes, did a voice she faintly recognized pulled her back to reality.

"Twice in one week? Must be my lucky day" Troy chuckled, sitting down beside Gabriella on the park bench. He was wearing a tight blue top, accentuating his muscled body. She sighed, dear god, of all the places and people.

"Do you bring your daughter to the park much? Colby and I come every Saturday". He seemed to make himself pretty comfy on such an uncomfortable bench.

She sighed… again. Hadn't they already gone over this? "She's actually my niece and no I don't come much, I'm not a huge fan of parks".

"Oh but I thought..." What this his idea of flirting? If it was… not working, and oh, side note, he needs to get some better pick up lines.

"You thought wrong". She felt horrible for being so sharp with him but she didn't feel in the mood to make conversation with some father with a kid in first grade. "I'm a lawyer; my father owns Schwartz and Montez in town. I'm going to take it over in a couple of years"

"Impressive" Troy nodded, watching Colby and Morgan across the park. After a long silence, Gabriella decided making conversation would be the polite thing to do. She _had_ hoped that he would sense she didn't want to talk to him and go away, but with no such luck, she began to speak.

"What about Colby's Mom? She work at weekends?" To her, the question seemed fairly innocent, by Troy's sudden change in posture, she got a feeling that this was anything but simple.

"Actually…" he began, an uncomfortable look gracing his face, matching the same emotions that his posture did. "She left when Colby was 8 months old, we haven't heard from her since".

As Gabriella sat and listened to him talking, she felt sorry for him, but even more sorry for his young daughter.

"Not even birthday cards? Christmas presents?" She couldn't wrap her head around such a concept. She never had to go through that kind of thing herself, actually, her childhood was pretty sheltered, one full of family, laughter, and simplicity.

Troy shook his head sadly. "Nothing. Not even a phone call. It's Colby I'm worried for, who knows what effect this is having on her".

"She seems happy enough" Gabriella observed, seeing her laughing with Morgan across the park.

"She's okay now. But what about when she's a teenager? I dread to think about that to be honest…" Troy ran his hand through his brown hair, she had to admit, he wasn't _that_ bad looking.

"Vanilla ice-cream for you, and … Who's this?"Taylor beamed, giving Gabriella a questioning look as she handed Gabriella her ice-cream.

"I'm good" Gabriella replied, holding her hand up. "Let the girls have them and this is… erm… this is…" she felt embarrassed that she couldn't even remember his name.

"Troy" he said, smiling at Taylor as he held his hand out. She shook it, smiling back at him. Taylor shot Gabriella a quick side look, even though Taylor was married, she herself silently admitted how good looking the man actually was. While Taylor's attention was on Gabriella, Troy glanced at the watch on Taylor's wrist.

"Is that the right time?" he asked, an air of panic in his voice.

"Uhuh" Taylor said, checking her watch. Troy seemed to all of a sudden be in a rush, trying to quickly wrap up the conversation.

"It was nice to meet you, and nice to see you again urrghh…" He rubbed the back of his neck, not knowing what her name actually was.

"Gabriella"

"Nice to see you again Gabriella" he smiled as he called Colby over.

"Maybe I'll run into you at the next school play" he waved as he and his daughter headed out of the park. Little did they know they'd be meeting again a lot sooner than they planned.

-----------------

**A/N**

**Thanks for reading, please leave us your thoughts in a review, next chapter up soon**

**Love Helena**** x ****x**

**A/N: Hey everyone, its Nicole here. Helena did a great job on this chapter. Way to go Helena! Anyway, we hope you all enjoy it and hopefully the next chapter will be up soon!**

**Disclaimer: We only own the ideas!**


End file.
